Lasitha Perera

Biography

Lasitha Perera is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of The Development Guarantee Group (DGG) and has extensive experience in debt capital markets and structured finance across developed and developing markets. DGG is the manager of the Green Guarantee Company (GGC), the climate focused emerging markets guarantor, as well as the manager of Scaling Alternative Finance for Entrepreneurs (SAFE), a forthcoming guarantor developed by DGG in collaboration with the BMZ, KfW and the European Commission. Prior to DGG, Lasitha was Chief Executive Officer at GuarantCo, part of the Private Infrastructure Development Group, where under his leadership the guarantee portfolio tripled to USD 950 million and the capital base doubled to over USD 650 million. He also established key partnerships including with the London Stock Exchange, leading to the first offshore listing of local currency bonds from Ghana and Kenya and conceptualised the InfraCredit local currency guarantor model in Nigeria, which is now being replicated across other countries. Before GuarantCo, Lasitha worked at Barclays Capital in London and New York focusing on structured debt products. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in Law from Bristol University.